What were folk really expecting. Had avoided this but just watched it as a family and it was good fun and made us laugh. The big finale action train chase at the end was great fun and had us all laughing out loud - yes ridiculous but it hardly set out to take itself seriously.
Tonto should have just called himself Jack Sparrow though.
Tonto was the highlight of the film, though Silver was a close second. I watched it today and was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. I didn't see it when it was in theaters, and had heard mostly negative things about it, but it's pretty much what I wanted from a Lone Ranger film. When The William Tell Overture finally played I couldn't help but smile, and the following 20 minutes was brilliantly choreographed madness. The Lone Ranger riding Tonto through a train, shooting at someone in another train was just too much, and perfect for how they'd built the film to that point.
I'm adding this to my short list of commercial/critical flops that I think deserved success.
Seems we agree on quite a bit, this film included, though we disagree on westerns, as many of my favorite films fall into that category. On a whole I'm not a fan of the genre, but there are at least 20 westerns that I rate as top notch films.